The Barista and the College Student
by Ohappydaze
Summary: "Vanessa Doofenshmirtz told him everything. She didn't know how it happened, how their friendship evolved how it did, or why she felt so completely and utterly open whenever she was around Ferb Fletcher." Fernessa, or whatever you kids call it.


Vanessa Doofenshmirtz told him _everything. _She didn't know how it happened, how their friendship evolved how it did, or why she felt so completely and utterly open whenever she was around Ferb Fletcher. Every time her father frustrated her to the point of tears, or one of her "friends" ended up stabbing her in the back over some matter or another, it wasn't odd for the young woman to call up a boy nearly five years younger than herself. Because Ferb didn't act like there even was an age difference: He listened, and kids aren't supposed to _listen._

It started when Vanessa started going to a coffee shop near the campus of Danville College, and who turned out to be the fifteen-year-old barista, but that oh, so very familiar green haired Brit? She ordered the same thing every day, and every day he gave her the same mocha latte with extra chocolate shavings; because Vanessa mentioned in passing that chocolate was her favorite, and of course he remembered that. He remembered everything she told him.

For instance, he remembered her birthday, when her boyfriend at the time completely overlooked the landmark date. That day, when Vanessa came in for her coffee, she took a seat by the window as she waited, instead of chatting simply but warmly with her friend, the barista. This choice in seating meant that Ferb would have to call out her name, which he normally got to avoid since she lingered near the bar.

The British accent was very distinct over the soft, indie jazz music, but it was the words that caught Vanessa's attention so sharply when he addressed her order as;

"Mocha latte with extra chocolate shavings, for the birthday girl."

Later that week, Vanessa dumped her boyfriend when he _still _couldn't remember that she had turned a year older.

Things changed shortly after that. She frequented her trips to the coffee shop, and soon found that she wasn't even buying a cup to go. She was taking her time to slowly sip at the sweet drink, savoring the small and meaningful conversations she had with the growing teen behind the counter while he worked. Soon Ferb was sixteen, and Vanessa, on his birthday, handed him back her cup.

"Uhm, hey, this doesn't have enough chocolate."

As always when he was around her, Ferb smiled a little and took the cup wordlessly back; not the single hint of annoyance or contempt in his thoughtful face. But when he took the plastic cup back to the toppings, he saw something scrawled across the rim in her creative, wide handwriting;

_"Turn around, birthday boy."_

Obeying the orders, he looked over his shoulder and there was Vanessa with that wrench he had passingly told her that he needed. And of course she remembered. She did her best to remember everything he told her, because what he told her was rare and scarce.

That's when Ferb started getting her orders wrong on purpose, to see what she would do. Vanessa caught on quickly; they were both smart, and she put her own twist on their game. She always had a sharpie with her, and was armed with a remark to write on the cup when she returned it with a joking complaint. The comments ranged from the playful;

_"I'm pretty sure coconut has nothing to do with chocolate, buddy."_

_"Do you have any idea how many mocha-latte trees you're killing?"_

_"Ungrounded expresso beans, Ferb? How am I supposed to work with that?"_

To the more personal;

_"Cute hair, today."_

_"Have I ever mentioned how incredible your accent is?"_

_"So you know, I've stopped coming here for the coffee."_

And finally, during Vanessa's last year of college;

_"We should really hang out some time. I'll miss you like crazy if I have to leave Danville without getting to know you for real. Then again, I'll get a decent cup of coffee, for once."_

The ending comment earned one of those rare, emotionally simplistic smiles from the green haired boy, and the carefully written phone number beneath it increased that smile, not matter how subtly. To Ferb, an inch meant a thousand miles, and a small quirk of the lips was the same as a parade in honor of his joy.

He called her first, though she did most of the talking. Graduation took place, and the stress of trying to find an apartment was evident in their conversations. But Ferb never complained, or asked her to change the subject. He just listened and gave advice when appropriate. Vanessa had a boyfriend, again, but one thing he noticed was that she seemed to speak very little of him whenever they talked.

And then he proposed. Her boyfriend of fourteen months and a handful of weeks asked for Vanessa's hand in marriage. Ferb was eighteen, no longer working for the coffee shop, but for an engineering company in the heart of the city. Vanessa was working at a retail store, where all the clothes were too expensive for her to buy. Her boyfriend was going to be a scientist, and for them to stay together, Vanessa would be moving out of the Tri-State area with him.

She neither declined nor accepted the ring, but gave her boyfriend a three days wait for her to come up with an answer. It wasn't the first time Vanessa had called up Ferb in tears, but it was certainly the most confusing. There was never any disappointment in Ferb's tone when he congratulated her on the news, unaware of the silent tears streaking down her face on the other line. In fact, it was that very even, selfless tone that made the dam break, and the sobs break loose.

Ferb was never mad at her, and what was more upsetting, was that Vanessa _thought _he was going to be mad at her for being proposed to: Something she had no control over and, what's more, shouldn't affect the younger boy. _Shouldn't _being the key word. So why did she feel so bad for telling him what was supposed to be the happiest news of her life? A feeling of betrayal had inexplicably snaked its way into her chest, and she half expected Ferb to hang up on her when she did nothing but cry for nearly ten minutes.

Of course he didn't. He only soothed her the best way he could; through understanding silence that reached through the phone and over her shaking body. Vanessa had no explanation for these tears, and could only tell Ferb that much. Genius as he was, though, Ferb had come up with the perfect thing to say that triggered a wave of thoughts and understanding;

"Well," He said softly, "Vanessa, do you really love him?"

Three days later, the answer was no. To both the ring, and Ferb's question. Her boyfriend was heartbroken, or so he played. A year later, the story of him and his new trophy wife were the smiling faces of the front page newspaper, next to the article about Ferb's honored award nomination for his invention of a kind of rod that harnessed and stored lightning to power homes, and cities.

Vanessa was there when he received the award; Ferb had invited her. She sat alongside his half-bored sister, his overly proud parents, and his beaming, excited brother. It was as if she had been accepted by the entire family, and Ferb had become a permanent part of her life. Even Perry felt like a friend, no matter his status as her father's, retired arch nemesis.

When she ran to hug Ferb in the lobby of the event building, and took the introverted man hard in her embrace, Vanessa had a realization. She stayed with the family to celebrate and then, late in the night, drove home and stayed up awake in her bed with this new development stirring chaos in her mind and heart.

The next day, she called Ferb as she usually did, and they talked about the ceremony and how, _"Over-zealous it all really was, considering the actual award is about the size of my hand." _as Ferb put it. But when he hung up, apologetically blaming a work call, Vanessa didn't feel as satisfied as she used to be. A hard knot tied itself up in her chest, and only untangled when he called back, five hours later, when she had barely moved an inch since he hung up.

Then one day, Ferb never called back. He promised her five o' clock, just like every day, but he broke his word, which is something Ferb Fletcher never did. Vanessa was angry with him, at first, and then she was worried and anxious. When she finally got a call, it wasn't from Ferb, but from Phineas. Vanessa remembered how happy he always sounded, so the sorrowful worry in his tone stopped her heart.

"Ferb's been in a car crash," Is what he told her in brief, "He's unconscious right now, but they said he's stable, and should wake up in a few days at most."

That's all it took to get Vanessa down to the hospital. When she saw Ferb, wrapped, beaten and bruised, her throat constricted, and her heart was sent into a panic. Phineas was by his side at the time, half asleep and haggard in features. He had been there since the crash late the other night, and now Vanessa relieved him of his watch duty, and promised to stay by Ferb's side for the night.

And she did. Every night for three nights until Ferb opened his eyes. She was the first one he saw, and once he became aware of what happened, and how he ended up so hurt, he took it in silence, then stared deep into Vanessa's tear-rimmed eyes.

"So sorry I didn't call." He said, simply, the accent in his voice hoarse from such disuse. Vanessa just laughed and let the tears finally spill over as she took his hand and stroked it unknowingly with her thumb.

Weeks passed, and Ferb was released from the hospital with his leg in a cast, and mounds of work back at his office. When medical leave was lifted from his position in the engineering company, Vanessa didn't hear from him for days. She began sulking, and sulking even more when she couldn't explain why she felt like she did, or why she was being so selfish when Ferb was the one who had his leg crushed in a wreck.

Days upon days passed without Ferb in her life, and in those days, an old ex of Vanessa's called her up and suggested a second chance. It was the one who forgot her birthday and who, apparently, never stopped loving her. After her bad mood reached tipping point, the indignant woman brutally turned him down without an ounce of sympathy, and was left feeling worse than ever.

Another handful of days, and Vanessa was certain she had reached breaking point again. She was eating cereal late at night, not caring to go out and buy anything decent, when the phone rang. She had never taught herself not to get so hopeful when it rang, but when the caller ID popped up, she was glad she never learned her lesson. When Ferb's number appeared across the screen, her heart felt as if it burst, and the happy feeling exploded through her body and struck her with energy like lightning.

Which was all very well, too, because Ferb wasn't calling to talk to her. He was calling to ask her to come meet him in person in Danville park. All too eager, Vanessa didn't care that her makeup was off, and her hair was falling out of the sloppy pony tail, she only promised to be there in ten minutes, and hung up. Having the concern only to throw on a pair of jeans and a tank top, Vanessa yanked on her boots and hurried to the park as fast as the laws of the road would allow her: She made extra sure to be careful, the image of Ferb's broken body forever haunting her mind.

When she got to the park, Vanessa stood back a few feet when she found Ferb. He was sitting on a bench, staring up at the stars with two steaming cups in his hands, and his crutches leaned against the backboard of the seat. The feeling of happiness was almost too much to contain, but Vanessa's sub-conscious was screaming at her to take a moment and just look at him. The next fall of events, whatever they would be, would change her. That much she knew.

Ferb was now twenty years old. So young for his job position, his achievements, and the respect he earned, but yet so perfect for him. Vanessa couldn't think of him as anything other than the genius she knew he was, except maybe that crazy green-haired kid who seemed to end up wherever she was: Even in Paris.

Her mad grin dimmed to a sentimental smile, Vanessa walked over to him with a bounce in her step. When he saw her, she was nearly blown away when she didn't just get a small upward tip of the lips, but a grin. A real grin. Something she was certain only his closest friend, his brother, had seen before. It made her feel as if she could fly, but something weighed her down. It was the cup of mocha latte with extra chocolate shavings on it that he extended kindly to her.

Vanessa took it wordlessly and sat next to him. As if nothing had changed them from their normal routine, she made a smart remark about whether or not he got her order right, and Ferb nodded as a promise that he did. Then they started to talk in person, and Vanessa found herself spilling out everything, again, forgetting to even take a drink from her coffee. She told him about stupid things, like her idiotic ex, and how she turned him down. And she told him about meaningful things, like how worried she had been about him, and how weird it was not to have him call.

It seemed she had been talking for hours when she at last looked at Ferb, who hadn't spoken a word, yet watched her with the same, genuine interest as she relayed her life to him. His cup was empty, and now he merely held it because he didn't want to get up and disrupt her stories. Vanessa noticed this, and for the first time, she noticed how much their conversations had been her talking, and him listening. With guilt suddenly weighing her down, she questioned this with furrowed eyebrows.

"How come you never complain about listening to me? I mean, I talk all the time, and it must be impossible for you to get a word in."

Ferb then caught her off guard by waving a hand over to her untouched coffee. Vanessa sat up and raised the cup into the moonlight, trying not to make the shift in her heart noticeable when she saw the words scrawled in sharpie;

_"I love listening to you talk."_

Her pulse raced faster, and the involuntary need to cry out of joy stretched within her as the smile stretched outward. With her brown eyes focused intently on the cup, she almost spoke in a whisper.

"But what about you?"

Ferb shifted in his seat so his elbows were on his knees, and he looked over at her with that placid expression that spoke in volumes for those who knew how to read it.

"All you need to know about me is that I love you." He said, factually.

Vanessa spilled her coffee all over the walkway by the bench and Ferb's crutches crashed to the ground as she threw her arms around him and their lips met. For once, neither talking, but both listening to a synchronized beating of hearts that all began with a barista and a college student.


End file.
